“The stronger yen is probably the main driver” of the bigger declines in Japanese stocks, Gary Dugan, who helps oversee about $53 billion as Singapore-based chief investment officer for Asia and the Middle East at Coutts & Co., the wealth management unit of Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc, said by e-mail Jan. 30. “Investors are locking in profits as they back away from equities.”

It has to be the Fed and the yen. It’s certainly not Japan’s domestic economy.

Here, “a host of very positive data coming out of Japan has been largely ignored by financial commentary,” Marketfield Asset Management’s Michael Shaoul wrote clients on Monday. Strong employment data, a jump in industrial production, and then on Monday, a positive reading on auto sales:

This morning saw the release of excellent vehicle sales data, with January sales totaling 292.4K, a gain of 27.5% YoY. This represents the largest January sales data since 1997, a measure of quite how strong sales were last month (see seasonal chart).

Of course we must throw in some caveats. January is not the most important month for sales, which more than typically register more than double in March and the trailing 12 month ma of sales is also yet to break out with its current reading of 277K no higher than that of February 2013. Additionally all consumption items are probably experiencing demand being pulled forward by the upcoming sales tax hike. However, even allowing for all the above we would view this morning’s data as a genuine positive data point, particularly given that is comes amidst of a host of other indications that Japan’s domestic economy is awakening.

Japan ETFs in the U.S. Tuesday aren’t falling as hard as the home market overnight (They did plenty of declining on Monday). WisdomTree Japan Hedged Equity fund (DXJ) is down by 1%. iShares MSCI Japan Index fund (EWJ) is down by 1.2%.

ProShares UltraShort Yen (YCS), down nearly 8% in 2014, is ahead by 0.9%. db-X Trackers MSCI Japan Hedged Equity ETF (DBJP) is off by 0.8% and WisdomTree Japan SmallCap Dividend ETF (DFJ) is down by 2.3%.

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As exchange-traded funds and other investing vehicles have ballooned in number, the task of figuring out what works well and what doesn’t has only gotten harder. Barrons.com’s Focus on Funds looks under the hood of ETFs, mutual funds and hedge funds for overlooked values, actionable ideas and the latest pitfalls for fund investors.

Chris Dieterich has covered the U.S. stock market for The Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones Newswires. He is a graduate of Regis University and the Missouri School of Journalism.